BNC

Camera Format

The approximate size of a camera image pickup device. This measurement is derived from the
diagonal line of a chip. Common formats are 1/6, 1/4, 1/3, 2/3 and 1".

CCD

Charge coupled device, a flat thin wafer that is light sensitive and forms the imaging device of most modern cameras. Size is measured diagonally and can be 1/3"-1/2" or 2/3". There are two types, frame transfer and interline transfer.

CCIR

The European 625 line standard for the video signal.

C-Mount

An industry standard for mounting a lens to a camera with a 1" x 32 thread and a distance from
the image plane of 17.52mm from the shoulder of the lens. A C-mount lens may be used with a
CS-mount camera with a 5mm-adapter ring.

Coaxial Cable

A type of cable capable of passing a wide range of frequencies with very low signal loss.

Compression

The reduction in gain at one level of a picture signal with respect to the gain at another level of the same signal.

CS-Mount

An industry standard for mounting a lens to a camera with a 1" x 32 thread and a distance from the image plane of 12.52mm from the shoulder of the lens. A CS-mount lens may not be used on a C-mount camera.

Depth of Field

The in-focus range of a lens or optical system. It is measured from the distance behind an object to the distance in front of the object when the viewing lens shows the object to be in focus.

Depth of Focus

The range of sensor-to-lens distance for which the image formed by the lens is clearly focused.

Digital Signal Processing

An algorithm within the camera that digitizes data (the image). Examples include automatic compensate for backlight interference, color balance variations and corrections related to aging of electrical components or lighting. Functions such as electronic pan and zoom, image annotation, compression of the video for network transmission, feature extraction and motion compensation can be easily and inexpensively added to the camera feature set.

Distortion

The deviation of the received signal waveform from that of the original transmitted waveform.

EIA

Equalizer

An electronic circuit that introduces compensation for frequency discriminative effects of elements within the television system, particularly long coaxial transmission systems.

ETHERNET

The most widely used LAN transmission network. Based on a bus network topology, it runs at a maximum speed over 100 meters of 10Mbit/s. It operates over conventional co-axial cable, thin wire co-axial cable and unshielded twisted pair cabling. This has several implementations - 10Base5 for use over conventional co-axial cable, 10BaseF for use over optic fibre, and 10BaseT for use over Unshielded Twisted Pair (UTP) cabling.

Field of View

The horizontal or vertical scene size at a given length from the camera to the subject.

F-Number

Indicates the brightness of the image formed by the lens, controlled by the iris. The smaller the F-number the brighter the image.

Focal Length

The distance from the center of the lens to a plane at which point a sharp image of an object viewed at an infinite position. The focal length determines the size of the image and angle of field of view seen by the camera through the lens. This is the center of the lens to the image pickup device.

Framerate

The number of frames per second that the camera produces.

F-Stop

A term used to indicate the speed of a lens. The smaller the F-number the greater amount of light passes through the lens.

Gain

GALVANOMETRIC

This is one method used on Auto Iris and Direct Drive lenses to move the iris vanes, open and closed using a coil operation.

GAMMA CORRECTION

An electronic correction carried out by the camera circuitry to balance the brightness seen by the camera to that of the monitor.

GATEWAY

A node that allows connection to another network using another protocol.

GROUND LOOP

An alternating current (AC) that can be produced in a cable. This is usually caused by parts of the system being fed from different electrical sources resulting in different earth potentials at each end of the signal path. This results in interference of the video pictures in the form of a black shadow bar across the screen or as a tearing effect in the top comer of a picture.

GROUND LOOP TRANSFORMER

An isolation transformer. There is no direct connection between input and output.

Lens

A transparent optical component consisting of one or more pieces of optical glass with surfaces curved (usually spherical), so that they converge or diverge the transmitted rays of an object, forming a real or virtual image of that object.

Lens Format

The approximate size of a lens-projected image. In most cases the lens will project an image slightly greater than the designated image size to insure the pickup device is completely covered. It is recommended that camera and lenses are the same format size. A lens larger format size can be used on a smaller format camera, however a smaller format lens should never be used with a larger format camera.

Lens Speed

Refers to the lens aperture or its ability to transmit light. This is measured in F-stops.

Line Locked

A camera that is synchronized to the frequency of its AC power supply.

Lumen/FT2

A unit of incident light. It is the illumination on a surface one square foot in area on which a
flux of one lumen is uniformly distributed, or the illumination at a surface all points of which are
at a distance of one foot from a uniform source of one candela.

Luminance

Luminous intensity (photometric brightness) of any surface in a given direction per unit of
projected area of the surface as viewed from that direction, measured in footlamberts (fl).

Lux

International System (Sl) unit of illumination in which the meter is the unit of length. One lux
equals one lumen per square meter.

Monochrome

MPEG4

ND Filter

A filter that attenuates light evenly over the visible light spectrum. It reduces the light entering a lens, thus forcing the iris to open to its maximum.

Noise

The word "noise" originated in audio practice and refers to random spurts of electrical energy or interference. In some cases, it will produce a "salt-and-pepper" pattern over the televised picture. Heavy noise is sometimes referred to as "snow".

NTP

Network time protocol.

NTP Server

A central source that can set the time of all network devices.

NTSC

National Television Standards Committee. Color Video Signal standard used in North
American and Japanese: 525 Lines, 60Hz.

PIC IN PIC

QUAD SPLITTER

A product that can display the views from 4 cameras simultaneously on one monitor. It is also possible to select any individual camera for full-screen display on real time monitoring, dependent on model.

RANDOM INTERLACE

A method of combining two fields to make one frame where strict timing is not a requirement.

REFLECTANCE

The ratio of light returned from a surface expressed as a percentage.

REFLECTED LIGHT

Scene illumination multiplied by reflectance. This is the amount of light returned to the camera and determines the quality of picture.

REFRACTED INDEX PROFILE

A description shown in the form of a diagram illustrating how the optical density of an optical fibre alters across its diameter.

REGENERATORS

Devices placed at regular intervals along a transmission line to detect weak signals and re-transmit them. These are seldom required in fibre optic systems. (Often incorrectly referred to as 'repeaters').

REMOTE SWITCHER

A video switcher to which the cables from the cameras are connected and which contains the switching electronics. This unit may be remotely located and connected to a desktop controller by a single cable for each monitor.

Sensitivity

For a camera usually specified in lux to provide indication of light level required to gain a full
video signal from the camera.

Shutter

Ability to control the integration (of light) time to the sensor to less than 1/60 second.

Signal-to-Noise Ratio

Signal to noise ratio, a measurement of the noise level in a signal expressed in dB (decibels). In a
video signal values from 45dB to 60dB produce an acceptable picture. Less than 40dB is likely to
produce a noisy picture.

Spot Filter

A neutral density filter placed at the center of one of the elements (or on an iris blade) to
increase the high end of the F-stop range of the lens.

TELEMETRY

The system by which a signal is transmitted to a remote location in order to control the operation of equipment. In CCTV systems this may include controlling pan, tilt and zoom functions, switch on lights, move to pre-set positions etc. The controller at the operating position is the transmitter and there is a receiver at the remote location. The signal can be transmitted along a simple twisted pair cable or along the same coaxial cable that carries the video signal.

TELEMETRY TRANSMITTER

The unit that is at the control position of a CCTV system and contains the keys, joysticks etc. for the remote control of pan/tilt/zoom cameras.

TERMINATION

The video cable requires an impedance of 75 ohms at normal video signal bandwidth. This is often called 'low Z'. There is a switch on the back of the monitors to select either 75 ohm or 'high Z' (sometimes 'high/low'). If a signal is looped through more than one monitor all should be set to 'high' except at last, which should be to 'low' or 75 ohm.

TIGHT BUFFERED

A type of cable in which the optical fibres are tightly bound.

TIME LAPSE VCR

A type of industrial video recorder that can be set to record continuously over long periods. Typically, this can be from three hours to 480 hours, achieved by the tape mechanism moving in steps and recording one frame at a time. This means that if set to record over long periods much information can be lost. For instance, in the 72-hour mode, only 3 frames/second will be recorded instead of 25 frames/second in the real time mode. On receipt of an alarm signal these machines can be automatically switched to real time mode. With rapid advances in digital storage and retrieval techniques the mechanical video recorder is now nearing the end of its life in industrial security systems.

Video Signal (Non-Composite)

WAN (Wide Area Network)

A network that covers a larger geographical area than a LAN and where telecommunications links are implemented, normally leased from the appropriate PTO(s). Examples of WANs include packet switched networks, public data networks and Value Added Networks.

WAVELET

Compression that is optimised for images containing low amounts of data. The relatively inferior image quality is offset against the low bandwidth demands on transmission mediums.

WHITE LEVEL

The brightest part of a video signal corresponding to approximately 1.0 volt (0.7 volts above the black level).

WORKSTATION

Term used freely to mean a PC, node, terminal or high-end desktop processor (for CAD/CAM and similar intensive applications) - in short, a device that has data input and output and operated by a user.